That’s One Long Hill
21 PAX successfully dodged an onslaught of vehicles this morning and shepherded our FNG, Red Stripe, through his first workout. None of it was pretty, but it was certainly interesting.
Thang
- Head up Little Ave and
cut across 51, run to the crosswalk, push the button, wait awkwardly with 21 dudes for the walkie sign, cross 51 - Circle up by our police escort in the Pet Supplies parking lot
- COP (all IC): LSS x10, IW x10, Mtn Climber x10, Low Slow Merkin x15
- Run towards Cabo’s, stopping at every crosswalk for 5 HR merkins
- Take Carmel Commons across Carmel and plank at Bannington for instructions
- Run down Bannington hill to street
at the bottompast the bottom and up a little bit - 5 burpees
- Run back up the hill
- 5 HR merkins
- Do this all for
five rounds (triplenickle)three rounds ($0.13)
- Run down Bannington hill to street
- Continue down Carmel Commons to parking lot and large rock pile on the left
- Form 7 groups of 3 for grinders
- P1 – curl and press lifting rock
- P2 – start lunge walk around set of 3 islands
- P3 – run from P1 to P2, take over lunge walk, P2 back to P1 to take over the rocks, and so on
- Once you get all the way around with lunge walks, switch to bear crawl
- Avoid cars on Carmel, avoid cars in Carmel Crossing parking lot, cross 51 at the CC crosswalk
- Gather at the base of the deck
- 5 donkey kicks
- Run up ramp and across the flat to next level
- Repeat to the top
- AYG down the stairs and back to launch
- COT, FNG naming, BoM
Moleskin
YHC picked up our FNG, Andrew, at his house at 0515 and headed towards Charlotte Catholic for another muggy morning of pain fun. Without any prompting, he came out of the garage with a towel and water bottle — more prepared than I’ve seen any other FNG; good thing because Centurion is definitely an aggressive way to start an F3 career. Merlot may, or may not, have been spilled (all I know is bushes were involved) and he put in a damn solid effort and earned the name Red Stripe (Mississippi State grad — almost got Hotty Toddy; wife and 2 kids; Forest Hill elder; Air Force vet; grew up in Jamaica). Red Stripe already knew quite a few faces upon arrival and hopefully will be back soon to get to know some more. Welcome, brother.
As for the workout, the day started as many do in Area 51:
- Chelms poked the bear the night before, trying to stir up trouble as any good (former) Site Q should.
- Scabby ran in not even breathing hard.
- Hightower showed again, getting stronger every time — consistency pays.
- I learned how his uncle, Utah, got his F3 name this morning; funny story, ask Utah sometime #polygamistButNotReally — getting to a workout early pays, chance to chat while the brain still works.
- Champagne
grumbledgently reminded us that this is not Fast Twitch, this is a boot camp, etc. - Toolbag dropped some trash talk that No Show was going to be a no-show again about 30 seconds before No Show showed.
- Tagalong showed up wearing his bright orange Dolphins shirt. Still not sure if it is cotton, but it sure looks warm.
- Shrinkwrap bragged about how he has been practicing his cadence counting at home. We’ll have to see it to believe it.
- Rachel pointed out that Champagne wouldn’t know a Fast Twitch workout if he saw one based on his attendance record at said AO.
- Runstopper wore a perfectly color coordinated outfit (sans tights — must be summer).
- Chelms
jumped the gunwent out hot and worked his way back to the 6slowly but surelypretty quickly. - Ickey Shuffle reminded us all of his imaginary holiday called No Burpee Something-or-Other. We ignored him. He probably ignored my call for burpees.
- Rachel and Lorax raced for pole position on the hill set with Brilleaux, Uncle Phil and a few more nipping at their heels.
- There was much confusion when anything involving partners is called, even moreso today since it involved 3 (most of this confusion was admittedly the Q’s fault).
- Runstopper pointed out YHC’s lack of color coordination.
- Cars did not cooperate and a lot of people were headed somewhere at 0535 in the morning.
- COT revealed the highest count of badass Respects at an AO in South Charlotte (Chelms, Shoe,
Champagnenot quite yet, Snuka) on a Friday morning. Less than usual, but 3 is still solid.
It was basically everything you might expect of a morning at Centurion. The most unusual thing about this morning was YHC at a Centurion workout. Definitely has been too long. Too many guys I look up to and that I enjoy working out with to let habit/bias (aka The Brave) keep me away so long. Recommend you also remember that this summer and try to mix it up a little.
Definitely seems like there is a lot more traffic on 51 and on Carmel than I remember there being. Seemed like every turn we made we were dodging vehicles in every direction. 21 is a large herd of PAX to move across those streets and YHC definitely could have done a better job of managing it. Next time we will just stay nice and cozy on campus.
Cut the hill set short today based on time when I realized this was actually going to be a Fast Twitch workout if we spent the whole damn time just running that hill. It’s definitely no Murderhorn, but that is one long hill. Downside, we didn’t complete our triple nickel. Upside, we had time for one quick sprint up the parking deck.
Enjoyed the time with the PAX of A51 this morning and hope you all have a great holiday weekend. Happy Memorial Day. Please remember to take a moment out of your time this weekend to remember the men and women of our armed forces who have given the ultimate sacrifice so that we can enjoy the freedom we often take for granted.
Announcements
- Memorial Day Convergence at RockZero – tomorrow (Saturday) – 7 AM – Calvary Church
- Memorial Day Convergence / Patriot 5K – Monday – http://f3metro.com/2018/04/29/memorial-day-convergence-and-patriots-day-5k-w-speed-for-need/
- Leukemia Lymphoma Society Charity Dinner on Wednesday, June 13th – Bout Time’s wife, Laura Palmer, is the keynote speaker. Couldn’t find info online so see Cooter for details (I think he is the one who announced it).
- F3 Pool Party at the Lawson pool on Friday 6/8 from 8-10 PM. Pool will be rented out just for our group. $40 per family includes pizza and beer and all proceeds will be used by our region in future projects with The Sandbox. See #the_sandbox Slack channel for details and sign up here: http://bit.do/f3sandbox
KBs at a KB workout, Brilliant
Hairband asked me to Q #F3Overdrive. That’s when you know he’s desperate. It’d be like me asking him to Q our Sunday morning long run. It would be a tall order for him and that’s really saying something. I guess when Lamont is still recovering from actually using his elbow at a workout, these are the kinds of things that happen.
In the most important news, Hoffa is now a Double Respect. Considering we give him no respect, pretty sure doubling zero is still zero.
The Thang
Mosey around the parking lot.
COP
Disclaimer for the FNG. Some smart aleck remarks when I said I’m not a professional. Hoffa tried to say something but his 30 year old dentures fell out. Better luck next time buddy.
SSH IC x25
IW IC x25
Mountain Climbers IC x25
Mosey back over to the bells and carry them over to the parking lot.
Simple Q on this one:
We will do the called exercise for three rounds. The timer is one of the PAX will run around the parking lot and we do AMRAP until he gets back. The kicker of this one is after each round, slide your KB to the right so you are constantly working with different weights through the rounds of each exercise. Modify as needed. And yes Bernanke, around the islands on each end of the parking lot. I regret affirming him in this later as I have to do reps while he moseys, picks flowers, reminisces about his times in the mountains and just generally takes forever.
Here are the exercises we did for three rounds each (order is sorta close to right):
Swings
Bulldogs
Clean and Press
Good Mornings
Swings
We did an Intermission SSH IC x25 just to help recover some of the PAX who were looking a little rough at this point.
Flutter Press
Lawn Mowers
Hold Bell Out Front – If you have to drop the bell, the penalty is Burpees AMRAP until the runner gets back
Swings
MOM
Rosalita IC x35
Dying Cockroach IC x30
DONE!!!
COT
Prayers for Lamont’s less than masculine elbow.
Prayers for YHCs FIL
Thanks to Snookie for taking us out
Moleskine
– What a day! What a day! GJ Qing a gear workout that was almost fully gear and Smokey showing up on a Friday. Both miracles. Both will probably take about the same amount of time to occur again. Which is sad. I mean, not sad that we don’t ever see Smokey again but sad as my Qs are the best.
– BW HC’d Thursday night. An HC as faithful as winning the lottery.
– Great to have Snookie with us. And I promised him he wouldn’t have to run while his foot still recovers and he was able to modify the run to a half-walk around the parking lot. Which was still faster than Bernanke’s run.
– Jabber was appreciative of being beside YHC for the constant chatter. He didn’t say it but I could just see that he was. Not so sure he was appreciative of us sharing bells though.
– Glad Woody/Edison were able to join us and power through as always.
– Bernanke joined us. Not sure I’m happy about it but he was there.
– Hairband seemed to be pleased with the amount of KB usage. I am sure he was nervous after my pre-tweet of using your KB a little bit. Notice I said your KB not a KB.
– Hoffa seemed angrier this morning. This is pleasing.
– Outland is closed tomorrow as Madison thinks people are going to drive 2.5 hours to a convergence. Or maybe he skipped this week on his 10 year Q plan for Outland. Either way, #F3TippingPoint is open in Monroe for what should be a great time as Hoffa is Qing. Hide your wives, hide your kids, the angry one is Qing.
– Last but not least, welcome to FNG Truman (Blake). So named because he once appeared on a reality show thus we played off of The Truman Show. He claimed to be a friend of Bernanke’s which is nice because that now doubles Bernanke’s friends list. Keep posting and that running will get easier and easier.
Thanks for letting me lead.
Glass Joe
Not a exactly a pre-run, but close
Some hardy souls like to pre-run at 4:50 a.m. Others like to fart-sack all the way until the luxurious hour of 5:30. But what about folks who prefer the middle ground? There is now an answer for you… Sparta. It’s a running-themed bootcamp that meets at 5:15 at Matthews Elementary. This morning we had four pax who gathered in the 110% humidity for running, burpees, LBC’s, etc (but mostly running). At the end of an hour, we’d run 5.6 miles, then followed it up with a large COT with the gentlemen from Peak 51. Not a bad Thursday morning…
Mosey to Matthews UMC
Take 3 laps in church parking lot
10 burpees between each lap
Mosey back to Matthews Elementary
Take 3 laps around school track, between each lap do:
20 LBC’s
Mosey back through downtown; stop at parking lot next to train tracks
Take 3 laps (up the stairs and by the coffee shop). Between each lap do:
7 box jumps on wall
Mosey back towards school and hop on greenway
Run down to the giraffes (sewer vents) and back
Foley-the-Virgin-Q and Scooter
For my VQ Posse lit the path with a sparkle-wheeled scooter and we drove off the police with rocks (in a sense).
The Warm Up
- Lap around the side-lot to get the blood pumping, then mosey to front-of-school with round of Imperial Walkers, classic Potato Pickers, and mountain climber. Then mosey to the bus loop.
The Thang
- Starting at the top of the bus-loop, ran light-poles toward the school with 10 Burpees, 10 Merkins, 10 Bonnie Blaires, 10 WW2 Sit-up, then dips on school benches until failure.
- Picked lifting rocks & paired-up. One ran loop while the other lifted rock: 150 tricep, 100 bicep, 100 full-extension.
- In “Serpentine Top-Lot”, snaked through lot, running between speedbumps, stopping at each bump alternating: Front-lunge, back-lunch, side lunge, repeating 3.1 times to end of lot.
- Reverse-mosey across the lot toward the school. A round of squats against school wall for 50 (or 60).
- Mosey to back of school. Set of 20 Supines on sidewalk rail, the calf-raises x3 up the set of stairs, then 10 Step-ups on school benches. Repeat x2 with Derkins replacing Step-ups.
- Mosey back to starting place with a few rounds of plank and merkins to take us out.
The Moleskine
- Thanks to Posse for coming out to support the team (and my VQ) despite a twisted ankle. He “modified” as needed by wheeling along with light-flash wheeled Razor scooter. Well-played, sir. Now get some rest.
- Police sitting in the bus loop with car running as well came around with lifting rocks and running circles around his car. We either disturbed top-secret recon, or disturbed coffee and donuts before his shift.
- Q-ing was no big thang. I might even sign up sooner than 18-months for my next go at it.
Saying goodbye is so hard
Conviction was started as a moderate for the Union County guys to give a new option on Wednesdays and an option to get some new guys into F3 from an area we’ve never really been in (Stallings north of 74). Unfortunately, not all things work like we hope not to mention it’s about impossible to cross over 74 with the Bypass work going on overnight and it just didn’t work. So, let’s try something new and move Conviction to Shiloh Elementary (one of the two Elementary Schools behind SV Middle). But, before we do, one more Conviction at Stallings needs to happen. And I normally take rest days on Wednesday but this week, I couldn’t make Thrive so I need to make up for it. Thus, here I am on my first official Q for Conviction on its last day at Stallings. And officially it’s moving to a regular boot camp at Shiloh unlike the moderate at Stallings but what will the Site Qs do to me if I go ahead and ignore the moderate deal? Never let me Q at Stallings. #makemyday
Horsehead gave me warning, I mean notice, that he would be attending. He wanted something more than moderate. Given his amount of posts the last quarter, a slow mosey would be more than moderate for him but he’s here and I haven’t heard him complain lately so let’s have fun.
The Thang
Mosey to the parking lot behind the school.
COP
SSH IC x25
IW IC x20 (I think, suckas forgot to count or maybe they can’t count)
Mountain Climbers IC x20
There was one more but can’t remember. HH probably didn’t do them anyways so they really didn’t count
Mosey to the baseball/football field. It’s dark and probably never been really visited before. And because your Q scouted the area well before-hand (hint hint BW, show up early for your Qs…not late), we went into the baseball field using the gate in the outfield rather than the infield gate which had a nice puddle.
Mosey to home plate.
Bear Crawl to 1B, Crab Walk to 2B, Bear Crawl to 3B, Crab Walk to Home
Partner up and one partner run around the fence in one direction and the other partner in the other direction and when you meet, Handslap Merkins x10. Then finish back at home plate. There was some confusion around the clearly given and explained directions. Horse basically hits the fence in left field and instead of following the fence around, he starts running back towards home plate. In what world does that make sense when everyone else was running around the outfield fence? Next time we’ll blindfold him, give him a bit and let Hoffa lead him around. Hopefully run him straight into a pole. Not even mentioning that HH didn’t even do the handslap merkins and did regular merkins. Some complaint around it stretched his ovaries to do the handslap portion.
Now that we are back at home plate, bear crawl to 1B/Lunge walk to 2B/bear crawl to 3B/Lunge walk to Home.
Again, we do the run around the field and this time, HH does the handslap merkins. Maybe he got his ovaries properly stretched out?
Mosey to the Football field on the lower side of it (because YHC as a good Q had scouted that the other end was soaked)
P1 run down the hill, 10 Bombjacks, Backwards run up the hill and back to where P2 is. P2 starts burpees. Partner combined burpees x50. I now learn that not only does he do his own thing in exercises, HH also doesn’t count his reps. Which might be because he isn’t doing any reps. #HHrefusal #shouldhavechosenShepherd
Now, Round2. Partner Combined Squats x200. At the bottom of the hill, Jump Squats x10. At some point, HH takes forever to come back up and is spending time setting up some broken chair. Normally I hate Hoffa but now I realize Hoffa is not the worst F3er ever. It’s clearly HH. He still isn’t actually counting his couple of reps. He claims 100 squats which would work out to about 3 squats per second. And when I got back to the top of the hill, he wasn’t doing any reps. #killme
Enough of this mess. Mosey back to the playground beside the school.
At the playground equipment, Derkins x20, Donkey Kicks in Swings x20, Step Ups x20 each foot (40 total to help Hairband understand how this is supposed to work)
Running out of time so only one round of that as I want to experience HH complaining and not counting his reps again. Waterboarding would be a lesser torture.
Mosey to the deep drainage pond. It’s strange. Guessing it’s a ‘pond’ for runoff that doesn’t have any runoff after the last week of heavy rains at times. UC engineering at work.
Partner Combine LBCs x300. At the bottom the of the pond, merkins x10, backwards run up. Here were HHs LBC counts: 7, 8, 4. #canteven
During all of this, HH complained that there wasn’t enough running. Which is the case when the Q calls a run around the baseball field and you go to one side and straight back. But, let’s ignore that he caused his own lack of mileage in all this and listen to his complaining.
Mosey over to the parking lot. Start with a mosey pace, at first light do your regular pace and then at the 2nd light, all you got to the end. Turn around and do it again.
Mosey to near the cars. For a short Mary, get on your six and hold your feet 6 inches off the ground and hold your hands straight out in front of you. Hold that until it’s time.
DONE!
COT
Prayers for a couple of the PAX’s Father-In-Laws dealing with cancer.
Prayers for Badger from Fort Mill and his family.
Thanks to Shepherd for taking us out
Moleskine
– Where do I even begin with this cluster? It had so much potential and then HH posted. Even Hoffa was tame compared to HH. I didn’t even get threatened with violence from Hoffa during the workout.
– Hoffa didn’t threaten me during the workout but pretty sure he did before the workout. He claims he’s happy when I’m not around and pissed when I am. Yet, two weeks ago, he describes going off on one of his customers. I wasn’t there buddy. But you are always at every moment when you get pissed. We don’t lovingly call you ‘Angry Elf’ for nothing.
– BW was still bragging that he’s not as short as Hairband. I mean, tallest midget still can’t reach the top of a shelf. You don’t get an award for being barely taller than Hairband.
– Shepherd was one of those complaining about the instructions given at the baseball field. Yet, he still ran around the field and did 10 Handslap Merkins with his partner. Remember not to let Mr Ed drag you down.
– I heard this multiple times: “Thought there’d be more running.” I basically got 2 miles. Any lack of running was due to a lack of effort only.
– So, Conviction at Stallings ends about like you’d expect. Just a cluster.
Glass Joe
In 2011 I was fortunate to become friends with a big, grinning Colombian lawyer named Danny Alvarez. We spent 23 days together on a ranch in Wyoming at Gerry Spence’s Trial Lawyer’s College, trying to become better lawyers and better people. We spent most of each day in class, but managed to sneak in a fair bit of hiking and fly fishing as well. I spent more than a few hours standing in the East Fork of the Wind River teaching Danny how to stalk trout, present a fly properly and bring a beautiful wild cutthroat trout to the net. When I fished with Danny I figured I could leave my bear spray at the barn. If grizzlies had walked up on Danny they would have thought he was one of them.
When given a weekend off, our little pack of friends made a mad dash for Jackson Hole for the weekend, determined to make the all-day trek up Middle Teton. In the group we had three accomplished hikers, a pre-F3 Chico, and the Big Colombian. He weighed somewhere north of 250, but managed to push us all up that mountain. Every time I was ready to give out, I would see Danny trudging up the hill and think, “If that big sonofabitch can get up this mountain, so can I.”
In the intervening years I have thought of that climb often, like when refusing to stop in a marathon when I was basically a dead man walking (in fact running right into the medical tent), or plodding up that nine mile BRR leg on the greenway. Every time I feel like stopping, I think of Danny continuing up Middle Teton, just putting one foot in front of the other. I even watch that movie MacFarlane sometimes for inspiration before a race. The one where Kevin Costner starts a cross country team from amongst the farmhand “pickers” that attend the local high school, none of whom imagined getting a college education before running took them there. They had grown fast from sprinting from the fields to school, and then back to the fields again. But in the end it was a big fellow named Danny that had to save them when one of his faster teammates faltered. So it is not only when I run up a hill that I think of Danny, it is during my pre-race inspiration as well.
Still my legs — or my will — have failed me on occasion. On leg 35 of the BRR. On leg 28. When it has happened I have felt like I was letting down not just myself and my team, but a friend miles away in Kentucky.
Danny’s dream was to become the first Latino ever elected judge in Kentucky. On his second try, he won the most votes in his primary on Tuesday night, and was well-positioned for the general election. We texted back and forth in celebration of his victory, but had last spoken just a few days earlier. He was hitting the campaign trail hard, keeping up a busy solo law practice, and still trying to be the best husband and father of three he could be. On Wednesday, still in the afterglow of his big win, Danny collapsed at home of an apparent heart attack, and he is gone. He was a workhorse until the end.
There is a video online of Danny at his grandmother’s grave during Election Day. He was humble. He was grounded. He was faithful. He was real.
I learned a lot from Danny Alvarez. About persistence. About faith. But he had much more to offer. I know no words of wisdom and frankly I don’t really expect to hear any. For now I am just heart broken.
I considered bagging my Q when I got the news, but I couldn’t do that. The only thing that made sense to me this morning was to go out with a group of men and run up hills as much as possible. I wanted to keep running up those hills like Danny climbing Middle Teton, to come face to face with the wavering of my own will and see if I could keep going anyway. Perhaps to make up for those times when I have failed him, and myself. Or perhaps I thought that doing that would make my friend seem closer. It did, for a moment, though right now he seems a million miles away. I will see him again. There are many hills in my future.
No Timidity for the Humidity
The Thang:
-Mosey to the little parking area past the amphitheater.
– COP:
– LSS (X20 IC)
– SSH (X20 IC)
– Merkins (X10 IC)
– Windmills (X15 IC)
– Mosey around track to the bridge; 5 Burpees
– Pick-a-rock:
– Squats (X20 OYO)
– Curls (X15 OYO)
– Flutter presses (X10 OYO)
(Repeato!)
– Deposit rocks; Mosey toward baseball park across the street; stop for 5 Burpees along the way:
– Butt Kickers down the walking track,
– Then, Lt. Dan’s (X10); Plank it up!
– Bear Crawl up the hill to the guardrail at the street; Plank it up!
– Mosey up the street/hill to the dead end side street, and partner up:
– P1 – Run down the street and back (1/3, 2/3, to the end; P2 – LBC’s (Flapjack – to 200)
– P1 – Run down the street and back; P2 – Dying Cockroach (Flapjack – to 100)
– Mosey back across the street to the Park; stop for 5 Burpees in the parking lot.
– Mosey around to the back of Hamburger Hill for some 7’s:
– Run up the (wet/steep) hill; 6 Burpees at the top
– Bear Crawl down the hill; 1 LBC at the bottom (Repeato until 1 at the top and 6 LBC’s at the bottom)
– Mosey around to the side of the Hill for 5 MOM:
– Dollies (X20 IC)
– Superman/Bananas
– A minute left for some Stretching.
COT; Thanks to DT for taking us out!
Moleskine: Despite the humidity, the PAX worked hard with very little mumble chatter, except for their disagreement over Burpees serving as an exercise break. The 7’s on the back of Hamburger Hill proved to be a “terrible idea”, but may have been easier if the Park had mowed the grass recently! We did break tradition on locations for COP and 5 MOM (GlassJoe needs to let it go and break out of tradition!). Finally, many thanks to DT for driving up from Ft. Mill to join us! Great to see you at Tipping Point/F3UC again! – Shepherd.
Plan B – Smoke the Q
9 pax for a sweaty smoker (for the Q at least). YHC had originally planned a quite different workout; however, upon returning from a DR Q and reviewing the Meathead backblast from last week, it was discovered there was too much similarity. Can’t have the same ole, same ole each week, so a new #weinke was in order. Here’s what Plan B looked like:
The Thang
Brief Disclaimer for the veteran pax (no FNGs)
COP
- Alternating swings – 10 IC
- Imperial walker – 15 IC
- Alternating swings – 10 IC
- Merkins – 10 IC
- Alternating swings – 10IC
- Prying squats – 3 variations (#perpetualcrowdpleaser)
- Alternating swings – 10 IC
- Halos – 10 OYO (5 each direction)
- Alternating swings – 10 IC
Partner Doubles – I
- Partner up with like-sized bells
- Ladder up 1 to 5
- Double Cleans
- Double Front Squats
- P1 works; P2 recovers; then flapjack up the ladder
- After reaching 5 reps, repeato
Waiter carry to playground via the long route – #activerecovery
Playground Ladder
- Ladder up 1 to 5
- Pullups
- One-arm presses (L+R)
- After reaching 5 reps, repeato
- If you finish first &/or your name is Rachel, do another set. #LarryBird
Suitcase carry back to parking lot via the direct route (extra credit for Voodoo’s waiter carry)
Partner Doubles II
- Ladder up by two’s – 2 to 10
- Double swings
- Merkins (with minimal reps, ensure full range of motion)
- P1 works; P2 recovers; flapjack up the ladder
- After reaching 10, repeato
- After second trip up the ladder, one more set of pax choice of reps
Mary
- Reverse Plank (#inactiverecovery)
Time
COT
Announcements:
- The Area 51 shirt preorder ends at Midnight today!
- Neon reflective shirts – https://f3.mudgear.com/collections/active-preorders/products/f3-area-51-reflective-shirt-pre-order
- Traditional black shirts – https://f3.mudgear.com/collections/nc-clt-south-area51/products/f3c-a51
- Memorial Day Weekend convergence – Saturday, Rock Zero
- Memorial Day – Monday – South Park – workout + 5k + extra mile
Take-out by Young Love
Quivering Moleskinne:
Typing this at 1500 (3:00 pm), YHC is still weak from the workout. Perhaps it was the pre-run, which went well, or maybe it was the heat/humidity, or maybe just an overly optimistic selection of bell size. Whatever it was, it smoked YHC. DOMS is expected…especially from the squats.
Plan A was a 30/30 for 30, but you all did something similar last week. So, despite a solo heavy day Monday, Plan B was for moderate reps to allow for heavier weights, with the option to use lighter weights and focus on form & time under tension. Either way, it’s your choice.
The musical accompaniment was awesome! Actually, I have no idea, as I was too deep in the pain cave to really notice, other than during the active recovery portions when carrying the bells to and from the playground. There were no comments, so either no one else noticed it either, or it was just meh – neither good nor bad but not worthy of mention.
Strong work all around, from what I could tell.
- Hoover rucked it, per usual, replacing the body weight he has dropped with weight in a back pack.
- Stone Cold brought the gun show, along with a shiny new truck, after too long an absence at Meathead.
- Rachel, Tulip, & Young Love were on the farther side of the circle, so it was hard to keep an eye on them. I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt, as the only trouble they gave was that I had to keep giving Rachel extra work. #idlehands
- Blazing Saddles, also repping the guns, and Turkey Leg partnered and quietly went about business.
- Voodoo sported double 24’s (53’s) for most of the workout – strong work – while still managing to offer pressing tips to TL and cueing YHC on squat posture in the later rounds. Thanks, brother.
Thanks for posting today, suffering through it together, sharpening & encouraging one another, and for making this the best site to Q and post. Aye!
20 Candles in the Wind
It was the day of days — Benny’s triumphant return to the gloom, if only on a part-time basis. 20 Peak PAX came out to discover that the man behind the workout has a busted leg — so, time to work on some arms.
Splitting up the execution of this tribute — your friendly neighborhood Site Qs.
Lois
Welcome to Bennyfest, here’s a disclaimer.
In addition to legal mumbo-jumbo, an addition of “I didn’t write this workout. If you don’t like it, complain to Benny at the end.”
Mosey to the church parking lot via the front of First Baptist. Circle up.
Sensei
COP
- 1 burpee OYO
- SSH x15 IC
- 2 burpees OYO
- Merkins x10 IC
- 3 burpees OYO (Pattern detected …)
- IW x15 OYO
- 4 burpees OYO
- LSS x15 OYO
- 5 burpees OYO
THANG
Line ’em up at the bottom of the parking lot. Partner up for partner suicides.
While partner 1 runs the gauntlet of lamp posts, partner 2 does AMRAP of called exercises. Flapjack.
- Round 1: LBCs
- Round 2: IW squats
- Round 3: Mountain Climbers
After a 10 count, mosey to the back bus lot.
Lois
Okay, we’ve tackled one Peak 51 staple — suicides — now let’s do another one, the Starfish.
- Middle: 5 burpees
- Corner 1 (Basketball goals): 15 Carolina Dry Docks
- Corner 2 (Geraldo Tree): 15 Merkins
- Corner 3 (The building thing where we often do donkey kicks): 15 Diamond Merkins
- Corner 4 (The giant oak tree): 15 Wide-arm Merkins
Again, this #weinke was composed by a man who is likely ignoring his doctor’s orders to take it easy on the legs.
After round 1, LBCs while everyone finishes up. Did we enjoy that? No? Well, too bad, because we’re going to do a second round. So, repeato.
After round 2, flutters until all have finished.
Mosey over toward Horsehead Valley to the grassy patch. Even though the ground is kind of wet, it wouldn’t be a Benny Q without a visit from Jack Webb.
Now, YHC managed to show off the awesomeness of his South Carolina public education (Kindergarten through Bachelor’s Degree, thank y’all very much) by skipping a step in the pyramid, so it went …
- 1 merk, 4 air presses
- 2 merks, 8 APs
- 3 merks, 12 APs
- 5 merks, 20 APs
- 4 merks, 16 APs
- 3 merks, 12 APs
- 2 merks, 8 APs
- 1 merk, 4 APs
Enough of all that counting, time for the big finish. Mosey back to launch, where we find the man of the hour waiting by his car. We all greet him as we run past, and for the final stretch of Mary, we turn to …
Benny
- Flutters 20x IC
- Rosalita 20x IC en Espanol, por favor
- Protractor
Time called.
Circle up … countin’ … namin’ … Benny with the takeout … lots of good 2nd F afterward.
-30-
ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Convergences-a-plenty during the holiday weekend. There is the Rock Zero convergence Saturday (preblast here) and the Memorial Day convergence and Patriot 5K (preblast here … contact Little Mike if you want/need more info).
Today is the last day to order an Area 51 short-sleeve shirt.
SKIN:
First, it was awesome to have Benny out at the end to wrap up with Mary and take us out. Today was really a celebration of him and what he means to this group. It was awesome to see a big crowd come out.
Next, let’s talk about the workout. When he sent it to me and Sensei, we realized pretty quick that if we did everything he put on that #weinke, we very well might still be out there (and it is 2:03pm as I type that last sentence). I like to think that the Sky Q was looking out for us by making it rain last night and therefore making the fields a little too wet for things like Planker’s Delight and the Tunnel of Love. Luckily, I know what it’s like to chop up other people’s work for length considerations.
It was funny when we did the partner suicides — it’s easy to forget that there is a minor learning curve. We just threw out the suicides, thinking everyone knew where to stop. Not so, since we’ve been lucky to have an influx of new guys recently. Luckily, they sensed our deception when we told them to run through the brick wall at the other end of the parking lot.
Also funny was that during said partner suicides, Bullwinkle just, I don’t know, appeared. The man is a wizard.
I think during the starfish, Smokey and Slim Fast were discussing some sort of summer work to keep their soccer-playing boys sharp … they said something about flying in a private coach, some dude named “Christian Pulisic” or something. They probably cut a deal to get him on the cheap. I get the feeling this guy is not going to be busy this summer and is looking for something to do.
Also during the starfish, I was chatting with Jello about serious matters of recent bumps related to the Southern Baptist Convention, but, as usual, that didn’t last long as it came out that I, as an ordained Southern Baptist Deacon, am eligible to oversee a legal, binding wedding ceremony in the state of Florida (No Rules — Just Right).
As usual, if I missed any good #mumblechatter, sound off in the comments.
Thumper, Bernie, Madoff, Compliance — you guys are doing awesome. Glad to see you keep coming out. Also good to see Insomniac and Fireman Ed over on our side of town. Welcome back to Lumberjack, who managed to not only get up to Everest Base Camp, but get back down as well. He claims that Mountain Climbers are in fact a help if you ever find yourself over that way.
Days like today are ones I look to and think that I’m lucky to meet up with you guys every week and put in some work. It’s a privilege to be a Site Q for the best dang group in Area 51.
Now I’m just waiting for the next email from Benny as he’ll want to secure a date ASAP for his actual full return to F3 later this fall. I’m sure it’s coming soon.